A drifting cowboy: Chatsworth and Horses, 25 years later

Back in the mid 1990s, I brought Sunup, my old palomino horse, from Cody, Wyoming to Larry Bower’s boarding ranch located on Browns Canyon Road in the foothills north of Chatsworth. A little over a year later, we moved to David Wendler’s Misty Hollow Ranch, and stayed there for several years.

My daily ride in those days usually involved some part of the Mormon Canyon Trail, but that’s another story… SEE: Mormon Canyon Trail

https://a-drifting-cowboy.blogspot.com/2011/12/cowboy-culture-mormon-canyon-trail.html

After boarding in Browns Canyon for about five years, we decided it was time to buy a home in Chatsworth, so we could keep our horses in our backyard, rather than paying board and worrying about them during the ever present Santa Ana Winds and accompanying wildfires.

It took almost a year to find the right place, and we finally moved to Chatsworth in the spring of 2000.

Right after we moved into our new home, we discovered the local city councilman and a developer pal, who was also the city’s airport commissioner, had plans to rezone horse properties in order to build higher density housing for their own gain.

In 2000, I founded the Chatsworth Equine Cultural Heritage Organization (Chatsworth ECHO) is a grass roots group of horse owners, horse enthusiasts, and property owners in Chatsworth, that had discovered a need for a public voice to protect horse-keeping zoning, to protect our trails, to keep them safe, and to create a public awareness for equine safety. We believed we may be the last of a rich equine culture that has existed in Chatsworth for more than a hundred years. We formed a 501(C)(3) not for profit, educational organization that was dedicated to advocating for Chatsworth's equestrian lifestyle.

Then in early 2002, when the San Fernando Valley attempted to secede from the City of Los Angeles, I became very involved over concerns about horse-keeping and property rights. I joined ‘Valley Vote,’ the lead secession organization, and then actually ran for office as a candidate for Valley City Council - District 3.

In 1999, Neighborhood Councils (NCs) were established in the City of Los Angeles in an effort to improve communication between the city government and the city's communities. In 2003, the Chatsworth Neighborhood Council (CNC) was formed and held its first election. I was elected as a board member and later reelected to a second term, serving between 2003 and 2007.

In 2003, I offered a drawing of a silhouetted horseman under and oak tree for the Chatsworth Neighborhood Council (CNC) logo. It was accepted and has remained the CNC logo for 22 years.

During my first term (2003) in the Chatsworth Neighborhood Council (CNC), I established two committees and served as chairman for both the ‘Land-Use Committee’ and the ‘Equestrian Committee.’

For the newly formed Equestrian Committee I used the old Chatsworth ECHO Mission Statement:

• To protect and preserve horses as a vital part of the collective experience of Chatsworth. Horses are a living link to the history of Chatsworth; without horses, the economy, history, and character of Chatsworth would be profoundly different.

• To protect horse-keeping zoning and property rights.

• To protect and preserve Chatsworth's equestrian culture.

• To protect and preserve existing equestrian trails, easements, and access to equestrian trails.

• To establish a voice in public affairs, such as planning commission meetings, city council meetings, and other governmental hearings that may affect equestrian trails, easements, and access to equestrian trails.

• To ensure that new equestrian trails are constructed as mandated by subdivision map approval, by community plan, or by proposed state, city, or federal park criteria.

• To protect and conserve the local environment around the existing equestrian trails of the Chatsworth community.

• To keep equestrian trails safe from dumping of hazardous waste and trash.

• To keep riders safe from undesirable individuals who are loitering or camping in and around equestrian trails.

• To establish a public awareness of equestrian - vehicle safety.

• To preserve Chatsworth’s Equestrian History.

During my first CNC term (2003) I founded the ‘Chatsworth Day of the Horse’ (now in its 20th year). The purpose of this event – which now draws hundreds of people every year – is to increase awareness among Chatsworth residents of the importance of horses in our community.

Here’s a good place to pause, and express my concern for Chatsworth’s equestrian future. During the past 25 years several major boarding ranches have succumbed to development, and no longer exist. In addition the hustle and bustle of the CITY has overwhelmed the rural nature of Chatsworth, so many of my equestrian friends have fled to friendly equestrian environments… they are in Arizona, Georgia, Idaho, Montana, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, etc.

While serving as a CNC board member I met and worked with several elected officials in both city and county positions, and gained their support on many issues. In 2004, Councilman Greig Smith appointed me as a Board Member, for the Chatsworth Business Improvement District Advisory Board. I served there until 2007.

I believe it was 2005, when Jeannie Plumb, a community equestrian activist, advised me that the Stoney Point Boarding Ranch was about to be sold and would likely become condominiums. I called Councilman Greig Smith and asked if the city would be interested in acquiring the property and preserving it as a boarding ranch. To make a long story short the councilman orchestrated the purchase of the property, and it is now operated under the guidance of the city’s department of recreation and parks.

During the 2004 city election I invited several Los Angeles mayoral candidates to come and meet with the CNC, and when Antonio Villaraigosa won the election I invited him to come to Chatsworth for a horseback ride, so he could see our unique neighborhood up close. He accepted and came to ride with us twice in 2005 and 2008.

WESTERN MOVIE HISTORIAN

I’d been a huge Western movies fan for over fifty years, and back in the late 1990s, a friend took me to visit the old Iverson Movie Ranch. That made me aware of the significant movie making history of the Chatsworth and Santa Susana Mountain areas.

I started researching filming locations in our area and began posting bits of history on my website, cowboyup.com. It turned out a young film producer was inspired by my web posts about the Iverson Movie Location Ranch, and decided to do a short documentary for the ReelzChannel. In 2007, Chris Meagher Produced, a ReelzChannel, Dailies show titled "Hollywood was Here - Iverson Movie Ranch." It aired January 2008, with Chris Meagher, Producer; Scott Conley, Host; Tracy Birdsell Photographer; Jerry England, Guest — Western Movie Historian.

Encouraged by Chris Meagher, Scott Conley, and Tracy Birdsell, I decided to published my research in a book, so in 2008, “Reel Cowboys of the Santa Susanas,” was published.

I immediately began hearing from other Western movie researchers from around the country, and made so many new discoveries that I was compelled to publish a second book, “Rendezvous at Boulder Pass: Hollywood's Fantasyland,” in 2010.

My books prompted requests for presentations about ‘Chatsworth Movie Location Ranch Histories,’ and beginning in 2010, I began speaking to various community and service groups such as: Kiwanis Clubs, DAR, Historical Societies, Museum of the San Fernando Valley, etc.

Because the CNC Equestrian Committee was formed in 2003, with the same mission as Chatsworth ECHO, in 2009 ECHO's board members voted to dissolve the organization, and to donate its remaining funds to the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy for the purchase of a plaque paying homage to movie cowboys and their horses, and asking that the plaque be installed at Chatsworth's Garden of the Gods park.

That plaque was erected 2013 by Chatsworth Equine Cultural Heritage Organization, in cooperation with Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy (Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority).